Example: Import an ESRI ADF File and Apply Style and Hillshading

In this example we import an ESRI
ADF format file that provides a raster terrain elevation data
set for the region near Yosemite National Park in the United States. The
data set imports as an image. We then use Style to style the image and to provide
hillshading.

As discussed in the ESRI
ADF topic we use File - Import
to import the ADF by opening the hdr.adf
file that is in the folder containing the ADF files for Yosemite.

That creates a table in the project plus an image that shows the table.
When we double-click on
the image to open it we see there is virtually no contrast to show the
data in comprehensible form. We can fix that by launching the Style dialog.

In the Style dialog we
check the Common color channel
box, we press the Full Range
button to load the full range of data into the Range
boxes and then we press Tally,
using the default number of 5 for the tally ranges. We press
the Altitude button
to load that palette into the color wells. We check the Shading box to apply
hillshading and then press Apply.

That produces a comprehensible display, but the hillshading is too dark
and aggressive.

Back in the Style dialog
we change the Z scale from
the default value of 1 to
a value of 0.1 and
then we press Apply.

That's better.

We Alt-click on the image's
tab to undock the image window and then resize it to make it larger, pressing
the Zoom to Fit button to
expand the view to fill the larger window. That gives us a better
view of the data.

The famous Yosemite Valley known to millions of tourists is the seemingly
narrow valley running horizontally across the image about one third of
the way down from the top.